CMF Industry and Market Trends: Looking back and ahead

This post is a summary of the presentation delivered by the director of Industry and Market Trends at the annual CMF Town Hall in Banff.

Created in late 2010, the CMF’s department of Industry and Market Trends is meant to help CMF’s decision and policy-makers as well as industry stakeholders better understand the fast-evolving screen-based industries in Canada and internationally.

We use different strategies to monitor and analyse new trends in technology, user’s behaviour or business practices. But beyond our role to gather information, what we're really interested in pushing forward is the sharing of knowledge. That sharing of knowledge is what I’m here to talk about.

To start with, you must know about Trendscape. This is the CMF’s Industry and Market trends blog. It was launched last year, here in Banff and remains a primary window to communicate our views on how Digital Media is shaping the future of content production and distribution.

Our intention going forward is to scale the content available on the blog and other communication platforms by introducing a network of contributors renowned for their expertise and influence in the field of digital and interactive media. We call this team the watch squad. The objective of this CMF initiative is to foster a collaborative approach to collect, analyse, and share information and knowledge.

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We also work very closely with different partners either as contributor or partner of more comprehensive research papers on different relevant topics. Last year, we participated in 9 of these research projects. Some are still ongoing but you can already access on our website.

A) Content Everywhere: a fascinating report on business and production opportunities related to the “videofication” of the Internet – which is the ever-increasing time spent by consumers watching video content online;

As of today, you will also be able to download these 2 new publications:

New Directions for the Financing of Interactive Digital Media in Canada is published by the Canadian Interactive Alliance (CIAIC) with research conducted by MDR Communications. This extensive endeavour is the result of a partnership with the Ontario Media Development Corporation and the Canada Media Fund with the assistance of the Bell Broadcast and New Media Fund, Department of Canadian Heritage, National Film Board and the Canadian Media Production Association. This study takes an in-depth examination of the current financing landscape for Canada’s interactive digital media industry. It also, it assesses the effectiveness of financial mechanisms that support the sector including the private sector, and identifies potential new financial vehicles that are of interest to public funders.

ABC of Connected TV is produced by Evolumedia and gathers structured and relevant key strategic information on an international level to allow media professionals to better understand the trends in Connected platforms and the changes it creates in the production and distribution of audiovisual and interactive content. This study which was originally published in French is now available in English throughout the country at no cost until July 10, 2012; so go and get your copy by visiting the CMF’s website.

I can also tell you a few words about some of the upcoming research projects among which:

An analysis on the potential and limits of crowdfunding;

A directory for alternative funding and distribution for documentaries covering Canada, US and Europe;

The development of an online producer's resource kit to turn-out and manage transmedia projects.

The last two projects are in collaboration with international partners, such as Media Europe and Screen Australia. This is in line with our objective to position CMF and Canadian producers in a Global Digital Market.

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We have also recently announced The CMF’s Digital Media Performance Measurement Framework. Co-directed by CMF’s Industry and Market Trends and Research departments, this project was developed in collaboration with a national advisory committee comprised of 32 members of the broadcasting; production and funding community.

As you know, the CMF was created in 2010 with the mandate of supporting the creation of Canadian content accessible anytime, anywhere on all platforms. Our mandate from the Department of Canadian Heritage and our commitment towards our Industry funders to reward success have lead to a way to consistently assess success of digital media projects.

The proposed framework that is now proposed covers the Performance measurement of Digital Media projects either funded as DM components in the Convergent Stream or anything funded through the Experimental Stream.

The coming year, we’ll continue to focus a lot on measurement, as we intend to optimize the use of the current Digital Media Performance Measurement Framework and have it evolve in the following years to capture more and more layers of this complex synergy in the digital environment and the interaction of different platforms and contents.

Among other initiatives, we will create working industry groups on specific topics such as online distribution of television programs or VOD. Another topic we’re really interested in investigating is how social media impacts content funded by the CMF. On this last point – and this will be my closing note:

We’re also announcing a pilot project starting at the end of June with a company called SEEVIBES wich has developed and already successfully marketed in Canada an analytic platform specifically designed to monitor Social Media activities regarding television brands. The Seevibe Social TV Index provides a clear profile of the social TV audiences allowing Producers and broadcasters to better understand viewers and increase their engagement. CMF’s objective here is to assess new audience and engagement metrics and validate if they could become relevant information to better assess and communicate success of projects funded through CMF’s programs.